The 10% Entrepreneur

Live Your Startup Dream Without Quitting Your Day Job

Becoming a full-time entrepreneur can look glamorous from the outside. Who doesn’t want to chase their dreams, be their own boss, and do what they love? But the truth is that entrepreneurship is often a slog, with no regular hours, no job security, and very little pay.

What if there was a way to have the stability of a day job with the excitement of a startup? All of the benefits of entrepreneurship with none of the pitfalls?

In The 10% Entrepreneur, Patrick McGinnis shows you how, by investing just 10% of your time and resources, you can become an entrepreneur without losing a steady paycheck.

McGinnis details a step-by-step plan that takes you from identifying your first entrepreneurial project to figuring out the smartest way to commit resources to it. He shows you how to select and engage in ventures that will provide you with upside outside the office while making you better at your day job.

He also profiles real-world 10% Entrepreneurs including a designer, a software engineer, a literary agent, a car salesman, an infomercial producer, a doctor, a stay-at-home parent, some students, and a few lawyers, as well as people working in finance, consulting, tech, and a variety of corporate roles.

A successful 10% Entrepreneur himself, McGinnis explains the multiple paths you can follow to invest your cash, time, and expertise in a start-up—including as a founder, angel, adviser, or aficionado. Most importantly, you don’t have to have millions in disposable income to become a 10% Entrepreneur. When you put McGinnis’s 10% principles into action, you’ll quickly start racking up small wins, then watch as they snowball into your new, far more entrepreneurial, life.

Table of Contents

PART 1 – Why Should You Be a 10% Entrepreneur?

Chapter 1 – One Job Is Not Enough

Why choose between the stability of a day job and the upside and excitement of entrepreneurship? By pursuing entrepreneurship part-time, you can combine the best of both worlds.

Chapter 2 – All the Benefits Without the Pitfalls

Part-time entrepreneurship offers compelling advantages: you will (i) diversify your career against risks, (ii) generate meaningful upside, (iii) make life more interesting, and (iv) think like an entrepreneur to win at your day job.

Chapter 3 – The Five Types of 10% Entrepreneurs

Depending on your resources and goals, you can choose to become an Angel, Advisor, Founder, Aficionado, or a 110% Entrepreneur. You can also combine multiple roles across your portfolio.

Part 2 – Building Your 10%

Chapter 4 – What Kind of 10% Entrepreneur Are You?

Entrepreneurship, whether part-time or full-time, is about formulating a plan and then making choices, both big and small, that will get you where you’re going.

Chapter 5 – Making the Most of Time and Money

When you’re setting aside at least 10% of your time and capital, planning and prioritization are essential to making each of your resources count for more.

Chapter 6 – Playing to Your Strengths

Your 10% is not about eating your broccoli. It isn’t about what you should do. It’s about combining what you want to do with what you do well.

Chapter 7 – Finding, Analyzing, and Committing to Ventures

Now that you’re up and running, your investment process will guide you as you identify and evaluate the ventures that will become part of your 10%.

Chapter 8 – Building Your Team

If you’re going to make it as a 10% Entrepreneur, you’re not going to do it alone. That’s where teamwork comes into the picture.

Chapter 9 – Overcoming Obstacles

Every entrepreneur, from 10% and up, finds that resilience and a firm commitment to a long-term vision are the most important tools of the trade.

Chapter 10 – Winning the Long Game

10% Entrepreneurs live all over the world and come from a variety of backgrounds. Their one common thread is mindset – they look for opportunity and then make things happen.

Connect with Patrick

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Tips and motivational bits for 10% Entrepreneurs

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Travel with me around the world and go behind the scenes

Live Q&A + additional info on how to become a 10% Entrepreneur

“Clear, concise and forward-thinking, The 10% Entrepreneur dives deeper into the future of today’s business world.”

“For 4 years, while working a full time job, I was also a 10% Entrepreneur. I didn’t know the phrase then, I just knew I had more money, more fun and more opportunities than I’d ever had in my life. If any of those sound like things you want more of, read this book!”

Jon Acuff, author of Do Over: Rescue Monday, Reinvent Your Work & Never Get Stuck

“Entrepreneurship is not one size fits all. It can take many shapes and forms. There’s immense value to testing ideas or weaving entrepreneurial qualities into your life before taking the plunge. The 10% Entrepreneur will tell you how.”

Christine Tsai, founding partner at 500 Startups

“We think of entrepreneurship as a big, scary thing, involving blind leaps of faith and sweeping acts of disruption, not for the faint of heart. Yet in today’s ever-changing world, everyone needs to act more like an entrepreneur and take risks — or risk being left behind. In his debut book, McGinnis delivers a winning game-plan for assuming 10% more risk, more creativity and more (ad)venture in your everyday life for 100% more satisfaction. Entrepreneurship is a smart choice for everyone–and so is reading this book.”

Linda Rottenberg, Co-Founder and CEO of Endeavor and author of Crazy Is A Compliment

“In a shifting corporate landscape, entrepreneurship no longer has to mean all-or-nothing endeavors. Patrick McGinnis uses his own expertise as a “part-time entrepreneur” to illustrate a proven solution for you to become one, too.”

Keith Ferrazzi, author of Who’s Got Your Back and Never Eat Alone

“This book should be read by anyone who has ever dreamed of starting an entrepreneurial venture.”

Nir Eyal, author of Hooked: How To Build Habit-Forming Products

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